Gov't downsizes amid GOP demands for more cuts

[phkrause]

Republicans and other fiscal conservatives keep insisting on more federal austerity and a smaller government. Without much fanfare or acknowledgement, they've already gotten much of both.

http://news.yahoo.com/govt-downsizes-amid-gop-demands-more-cuts-082500640--politics.html

[phkrause]

Oh but it has been happening, just no one wants to admit it, only complain.

[bonnie]

Oh but it has been happening, just no one wants to admit it, only complain.

Most understand that these type of cuts are only a small part of what is necessary.

This recent shrinkage has largely been obscured by an increase in spending on benefit payments to individuals under "entitlement" programs, including Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and veterans benefits. Retiring baby boomers are driving much of this increase.

SS,Medicare are not entitlements the last I knew.Unlike the majority on medicaid and welfare benefits the recipients actually paid in for years and years.Many area's of spending need to be cut and are not.

Another round of huge cuts — known in Washington parlance as the "sequester" — will hit beginning March 1, potentially meaning layoffs for hundreds of thousands of federal workers unless Congress and President Barack Obama can strike a deficit-reduction deal to avert them.

The federal workers that will be cut are unfortunately not the ones that should lose their power and position

[joeb]

Originally Posted By: pkrause

Oh but it has been happening, just no one wants to admit it, only complain.

Most understand that these type of cuts are only a small part of what is necessary.

This recent shrinkage has largely been obscured by an increase in spending on benefit payments to individuals under "entitlement" programs, including Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and veterans benefits. Retiring baby boomers are driving much of this increase.

SS,Medicare are not entitlements the last I knew.Unlike the majority on medicaid and welfare benefits the recipients actually paid in for years and years.Many area's of spending need to be cut and are not.

Another round of huge cuts — known in Washington parlance as the "sequester" — will hit beginning March 1, potentially meaning layoffs for hundreds of thousands of federal workers unless Congress and President Barack Obama can strike a deficit-reduction deal to avert them.

The federal workers that will be cut are unfortunately not the ones that should lose their power and position

The "huge cuts" of which you speak are a total of 2.3% of the total budget. I don't know about you, but 2.3 cents out of $1.00 is not a "huge" percentage of it in my book.

Don't fall for Obama's demagoguery of the issue. He wanted this--sequestration was his idea, not Congress' idea--and he threatened to veto any bills that came from Congress that limited these cuts. Now he is saying this idea came from the Congress. It's a flat out lie.

If you don't believe me, Google Bob Woodward, you know, of Woodward and Bernstein fame, and sequestration. He's a liberal, but what seems to be a very honest journalist.

[Ted Oplinger]

Oh but it has been happening, just no one wants to admit it, only complain.

It depends greatly on what "cut's" are defined to be.

To the normal person, a significant cut in a budget is a percent negative subtracted from last month's/year's available budget, with no new additional planned expeditures, as the money simply isn't there.

To the media and entrenched politicians, a cut is a scaling back of the projected increase to be added to last year's budget.

Government has really yet to get serious about actual cuts to the budget, yet they keep demanding higher taxes to pay for more and more programs with no demonstrable need which cannot be afforded at this current time and economy.

Blessings,

[joeb]

It depends greatly on what "cut's" are defined to be.

To the normal person, a significant cut in a budget is a percent negative subtracted from last month's/year's available budget, with no new additional planned expeditures, as the money simply isn't there.

To the media and entrenched politicians, a cut is a scaling back of the projected increase to be added to last year's budget.

Government has really yet to get serious about actual cuts to the budget, yet they keep demanding higher taxes to pay for more and more programs with no demonstrable need which cannot be afforded at this current time and economy.

Blessings,

You're exactly right. The "cuts", even in sequestration, are the reduction in the increase in spending, not real cuts in spending as the average person would expect them to be by the terminology used by the main stream press and the politicians.